Charlie Rose to Bill Clinton: You Are the ‘Best Political Animal That’s Ever Been’

Charlie Rose to Bill Clinton: You Are the ‘Best Political Animal That’s Ever Been’ (NewsBusters)

Charlie Rose’s interview with Bill Clinton at his own Clinton Global Initiative summit was, not surprisingly, full of easy questions but the PBS host saved his loftiest softball for the end when he called Clinton the “best political animal” of all time. 

In closing his interview, aired on the September 26 edition of PBS’s Charlie Rose show, the host couldn’t resist heaping this last bit of praise onto the impeached President: 

CHARLIE ROSE: So I close with this - there is no one I know in politics from the left, the right, Republican, Democrat, male or female that doesn’t say Bill Clinton is the best political animal that’s ever been in American politics and certainly in - for as long as they can remember. Tell me what you think that’s about? Why does everybody have that opinion of you as a political person?

BILL CLINTON: Well, some of the people who refer to me as an animal think I should be in a zoo.

ROSE: Yes.

CLINTON: And some of them acted as if I actually was in a zoo. No, I think -- look, I don’t know if it`s true or not, but, to be really good at this, you’ve got to like people. You`ve got to like policy. And you gotta like politics. You’ve got to have a pain threshold. You have to understand, there’s a reason this is a contact sport.